Norfolk City Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries.....Johnson, Patricia Smyle August 15, 2023
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/vafiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Robert Woolfitt http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00034.html#0008401 April 15, 2026, 9:28 pm

Virginian-Pilot August 17, 2023
Patricia Smyle Johnson
January 20, 1943 - August 15, 2023
The 80-year earthly journey of Patricia Smyle Johnson, mother, homemaker, 
teacher, community volunteer, master gardener, world traveler and partner for 
more than 58 years, ended August 15, 2023.
Patsy, a World War II baby, was born January 20, 1943, at Portsmouth Naval 
Hospital, the daughter of Lucille Smyle and Ralph Smyle, a Naval aviator. Her 
parents' marriage did not survive the war, so Patsy and her brother, Gary 
(Butch), who predeceased her, were raised by her mother, Lucille, a civil 
servant, as "latchkey" children, long before that term was common. Living in the 
Larchmont Apartments, she and Butch attended Larchmont School. From Larchmont, 
Patsy followed the West Ghent track to Blair Junior High (where she met her 
husband, Tommy, after a "Patches" rehearsal); then from Blair to Maury from 
which she graduated in 1960. A rare combination of extraordinary looks and 
humility - Patsy - in her senior year - both Ms. Commodore and the first 
homecoming queen of Norfolk Academy (which had no girls at that time) - was 
popular with all.
Patsy worked from 16 on to pay for her clothing and then to pay for college; 
first, at Mademoiselle (a ladies fine dress shop) and later she, along with her 
friend Judy Hughes, rose every morning at 4:30 a.m. to be at their post at the 
Virginian-Pilot where they took calls from subscribers who failed to receive 
their morning paper. Long before Google, Patsy, if asked the name of any street 
in Norfolk, could immediately identify its location and the district route 
number.
Patsy attended ODU, then the Norfolk division of William & Mary, year-round and 
finished in three years. Despite the whirlwind tour, she found time to be an 
inveterate bridge player at Bud's, President of her sorority, Ms. Troubador 
finalist and Queen of Revellers.
Patsy's peripatetic teaching career began in Norfolk in 1963 as a third grade 
teacher at Poplar Hall Elementary; in 1965, she moved to Cleveland (where Tommy, 
to whom by then she was married, was stationed in the Army) - she taught during 
the day in a Cleveland suburb elementary school and at night a GED course for 
soldiers; from 1966 to 1969, she taught in Charlottesville at Clark Elementary 
to put Tommy through law school; in 1969, she returned to Norfolk and taught at 
Norfolk's school for unwed mothers, Coronado.
Patsy's return to Norfolk in 1969 marked the beginning of a new career. Thomas 
arrived in September within a month of her return, followed by Elizabeth two 
years later and Gary seven years thereafter, all of whom survive.
Always ready to do her part in the community, Patsy devoted her talents to the 
King's Daughters as a volunteer and the Chrysler Museum as a docent and flower 
impresario.
Patsy's boundless energy found an outlet in gardening. She, together with her 
next-door neighbor and friend, Lynn Clark, together laid her garden's borders 
brick by brick by hand - Tommy ever playing the Tom Sawyer role supported by 
praise. The bricks were sourced surreptitiously each day after the close of work 
from buildings being demolished in East Ghent. Patsy and Lynn (oblivious to 
their larceny) remarked on the thoughtfulness of the workers to stack the bricks 
at the curb for convenient station wagon pickup. One has to wonder what the 
workers thought each morning as they returned to see their inventory depleted.
Patsy hated order in her garden; a profusion of unusual plants and flowers was 
her trademark - she never saw a plant she couldn't name, and no one had 
knowledge sufficient to dispute her. Her garden was on the Garden Club of 
Virginia Historic Garden Week twice. In 2002, Patsy received the Garden Club of 
America Horticultural Award (Zone VII).
In time, Patsy expanded her gardening efforts to community projects like the 
Fred Huette Center in Ghent as a master gardener.
Her children's maturity freed Patsy for another great passion - travel. As her 
father-in-law once said about Patsy and his wife, Mildred, if the devil came by 
and offered an opportunity "to go to hell" both of them would have responded in 
unison "let me first get my handbag."
You name it and Patsy (usually along with her travel partner and dear friend 
Julia Harkins) have seen it - Great Wall of China, Serengeti Plain in a hot air 
balloon, Hall of the Kings, Machu Picchu, the Nazca Lines in a light plane, Cape 
Horn, the Great Barrier Reef, Komodo Island, Mumbai, Dubai, the Adriatic Coast, 
Iguazu Falls, Panama Canal, northern Michigan every summer to Julia's farm 
(reached after a 19 hour nonstop drive with two giant slobbering dogs and a 
contentious cat in the backseat) and with family, Hells Canyon rafting, Hawaii, 
Ocean Reef, Butchard Gardens Victoria, Canada (perhaps her favorite garden where 
again no plant went unnamed). Each trip an experience to enjoy and about which 
to reminisce.
Despite the impact of corticobasal syndrome, a rare form of dementia, that 
robbed Patsy first of her speech and ultimately her awareness, Patsy's final 
years were spiced by her travels and family vacations at Sandbridge and later 
Figure Eight Island, North Carolina.
She died peacefully in her home surrounded by her family.
Besides her children, Tom (Alison, his wife), Elizabeth (Walker Simmons, her 
husband) and Gary, and her husband, Tommy, she is survived by six grandsons, 
Walker Simmons, Jr. and Eli Simmons of Charlotte, North Carolina, Thomas G. 
Johnson, IV and Henry Clifford of Virginia Beach, Virginia, and Louis Johnson 
and Arthur Johnson of Brooklyn, New York, and her favorite granddaughter and 
portraitist Mary Claiborne Simmons (Macie), also of Charlotte, North Carolina.
Heartfelt thanks are extended to her devoted and faithful caretakers, Vedette 
Spellman, Kelly Byrne and Toinetta Turner.
H.D. Oliver Funeral Apts., Norfolk Chapel, is in charge of arrangements. Burial 
will be private in Elmwood Cemetery, Norfolk, Virginia. Memorial service will be 
held at Christ & St. Luke's Episcopal Church on Saturday August 19th at 11:00 
A.M.

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/norfolkcity/obits/j/johnson19548nob.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.net/vafiles/

File size: 6.7 Kb